³⁴ Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.^(A)

²³ For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.”

¹⁶ Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey^(A)—whether you are slaves to sin,^(B) which leads to death,^(C) or to obedience, which leads to righteousness?

²³ but I see another law at work in me, waging war^(A) against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin^(B) at work within me.

³ So also, when we were underage, we were in slavery^(A) under the elemental spiritual forces^[a] of the world.^(B)